Leading human rights activist escapes death in failed assassinaton attempt

Описание: (21 Sep 2002)

1. Exteriors of Carlotto's house
2. Various shots of police investigating
3. SOUNDBITE: (Spanish) Estela Carlotto, Human Rights Activist:
"What happened was from a car they fired shots and you can see what they did to the front of the house when the bullets went in. They have shot up the walls and the metal plates of the doors."
4. Cutaways or damaged interiors house
5. Photo of Laura, the daughter who was murdered during the dictatorship
6. Glass on floor and bullet holes in the walls
7. SOUNDBITE: (Spanish) Estela Carlotto, Human Rights Activist:
"I think that this is a direct response to the documents that we handed over to the court the other day, documents that testify to what is security in our country."
8. Cutaways of police
9. Close-up of weapon
10. SOUNDBITE: (Spanish) Eduardo Sigal, Senator:
"I do not have the slightest doubt that this is connected with the documents. Whoever did this crime could not accept them. It is a group that could be associated with authoritarian sectors during the time of the camps, the military dictatorship, and the wretched police. But this is a thing that they do not want investigated."
11. Cutaways bullet holes in the door
12. SOUNDBITE: (Spanish) Estela Carlotto, Human Rights Activist:
"In the garage we found cartridges which are the same as those that were found in the cranium of my daughter Laura when we exhumed her body in 1985."
13. Cutaways of police and of the mayor of the city of Buenos Aires, Anibal Ibarra, in the house

STORYLINE:

A human rights activist in Argentina has escaped an assassination attempt after shots were fired at her house before dawn on Friday.

Estela Carlotto, who leads the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, said she was at home sleeping when the shots rang out.

"I think that this is a direct response to the documents that we handed over to the court the other day, documents that testify to what is security in our country," said Estela Carlotto.

Carlotto's group has been struggling for years to find grandchildren who went missing during a 1976-1983 dictatorship. At the time, a right-wing military government was waging a "Dirty War" on leftist opponents that left at least 9,000 people officially reported as dead or missing.

Her group has also been pressing for prosecution of former military officers believed responsible for the kidnapping and illegal adoption of children who were born to women in captivity during the Dirty War.

A police chief said "no hypothesis" has been ruled out and an investigation has been launched. No one has claimed responsibility for the attack on Carlotto's home in La Plata, 60 miles southeast of the Argentine capital. An Itaka automatic weapon was used in the attack, police said.

So far, the Grandmothers of the Plazas de Mayo say they have located 68 grandchildren missing during the Dirty War and are studying many more cases.

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